It is just over one year since we started living in Chile. Even though we landed here for the first time in May of last year, we left almost immediately to spend three months in the United States and returned just in time for the annual nationwide party that occurs during Independence Day in September. This post is going to be about Chile and my admiration for this landmass that has only been growing since that day one year ago.
More specifically, this post is for the Chilean Pacific Ocean, for its prussian blue lakes and rivers and for the infinite pod of tranquility they are suspended within. We came back last week from a trip to Valdivia and it was like the soul-massage in the same way our other trips to the Chilean south have been. There was that ferry ride over the part of Rio Valdivia where it joins the Pacific Ocean and from the choppy waters, it was hard to tell if we were sailing on the river or on the ocean. Then there was that drive across the coast to the Reserva Costanera Valdiviana during which we had to stop at several points to look to our right and widen our eyes at the kaleidoscopic colours of the ocean and to take in the full breadth of the view we were privileged to find.
The next day, we drove down to Lago Ranco to rediscover the sense of calm we had experienced near Lago Titicaca in Bolivia and to varying degrees near all the many lakes around Pucon. The lakes in this region are giant mirrors with the kind of placid waters of lakes we read about in hackneyed religious/spiritual quotes.
Each of our travels here have brought us to places where I have been able to immerse myself in vistas to the extent of being conscious of only a sense of sight and nothing beyond, no mind to process thoughts, no skin, no ears, nothing else. This brings me to another related subject that strikes me everytime I return from these trips to magical places. I have spent many more years of my life than I would have liked listening to a lot of babble about what the religion I was born into means. That religion, which people have used as an excuse to pollute the most majestic rivers and lakes in the name of worship. I know there will be people who will be quick to talk about what the original scriptures meant in their purest form and how what is practiced today does not conform to what was meant to be. I find it pointless to talk about it in its purest form if it has degenerated into what it is today and if its current form has such big implications on the physical world around us. I will also not say anything about it being used as a whip to break spirits (for the most part, that of women) with except for stating that it is so used.
It took me a year in Chile to know surely that my idea of a Creator is reinforced in unpolluted crystal clear waters, in clean air and in mountains, that even today look just like they probably did when they were formed millions of years ago.
I know I have digressed but this is a rant that was long overdue. This is still, in fact a prosaic ode to Chile's natural beauty. I am just only also saying that apart from giving me something to feast my eyes upon, these landscapes have given me something much more weighty, they also gently reinstated my belief.
More specifically, this post is for the Chilean Pacific Ocean, for its prussian blue lakes and rivers and for the infinite pod of tranquility they are suspended within. We came back last week from a trip to Valdivia and it was like the soul-massage in the same way our other trips to the Chilean south have been. There was that ferry ride over the part of Rio Valdivia where it joins the Pacific Ocean and from the choppy waters, it was hard to tell if we were sailing on the river or on the ocean. Then there was that drive across the coast to the Reserva Costanera Valdiviana during which we had to stop at several points to look to our right and widen our eyes at the kaleidoscopic colours of the ocean and to take in the full breadth of the view we were privileged to find.
The next day, we drove down to Lago Ranco to rediscover the sense of calm we had experienced near Lago Titicaca in Bolivia and to varying degrees near all the many lakes around Pucon. The lakes in this region are giant mirrors with the kind of placid waters of lakes we read about in hackneyed religious/spiritual quotes.
Each of our travels here have brought us to places where I have been able to immerse myself in vistas to the extent of being conscious of only a sense of sight and nothing beyond, no mind to process thoughts, no skin, no ears, nothing else. This brings me to another related subject that strikes me everytime I return from these trips to magical places. I have spent many more years of my life than I would have liked listening to a lot of babble about what the religion I was born into means. That religion, which people have used as an excuse to pollute the most majestic rivers and lakes in the name of worship. I know there will be people who will be quick to talk about what the original scriptures meant in their purest form and how what is practiced today does not conform to what was meant to be. I find it pointless to talk about it in its purest form if it has degenerated into what it is today and if its current form has such big implications on the physical world around us. I will also not say anything about it being used as a whip to break spirits (for the most part, that of women) with except for stating that it is so used.
It took me a year in Chile to know surely that my idea of a Creator is reinforced in unpolluted crystal clear waters, in clean air and in mountains, that even today look just like they probably did when they were formed millions of years ago.
I know I have digressed but this is a rant that was long overdue. This is still, in fact a prosaic ode to Chile's natural beauty. I am just only also saying that apart from giving me something to feast my eyes upon, these landscapes have given me something much more weighty, they also gently reinstated my belief.
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